Merkel wins key German state polls
BERLIN: Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives beat their centre-left rivals in a state election in Germany’s most populous region, according to projections – a major blow to Merkel’s challenger in a national election four months away.
The western state of North RhineWestphalia, which includes Cologne, Duesseldorf and the Ruhr industrial region, has been led by the centre-left Social Democrats for all but five years since 1966.
It is home to 17.9 million people, nearly a quarter of Germany’s population, and is also the home state of Merkel’s Social Democratic challenger in the Sept 24 national election, Martin Schulz, though he was not on the ballot yesterday.
Projections for ARD and ZDF pub- lic television, based on partial counting, yesterday showed Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union beating the Social Democrats by around 34.5% to 30.5%. They gave the Greens, the junior coalition partners in the outgoing state government, only 6%.
This means governor Hannelore Kraft’s coalition with the Greens lost its majority in the state legislature. And it puts conservative challenger Armin Laschet, a liberal-minded deputy leader of Merkel’s party, in a position to replace her.
“The CDU has won the heartland of the Social Democrats,” said the conservatives’ general secretary, Peter Tauber, calling it a great day.
“This is a really bitter day for the Social Democrats,” said his Social Democratic counterpart, Katarina Barley.
But she insisted that “the national election campaign is only beginning now”.
The Social Democrats’ national ratings soared after Schulz, a former European Parliament president, was nominated in January as Merkel’s challenger.
But poor showings in two previous state elections since then had already punctured the party’s euphoria over Schulz’s nomination.
After a blaze of publicity earlier this year, Schulz has struggled to maintain a high profile.
National polls show the Social Democrats trailing Merkel’s conservatives by up to 10 points after drawing level earlier this year.